WEEK 2

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I thought I had come up with a brilliant way to draw my subject matter; the girl in my painting. However, 'thought' was the keyword. I had watched heaps of youtube videos of artists using drawing tablets to sketch and illustrate digital drawings, some of these youtubers being Jacquelin De Lion and also Kelogsloops. Although these two youtubers are much more talented than I am, I know that through all the years of doodling in school, and spending a lot of lunchtimes in the art room with my friends, built up my drawing skills to an exceptional level. So I searched online for drawing tablets and came across the Wacom Art tablet & Pen on sale at Might Ape. A few days passed and finally it arrived! After setting it up, I opened Photoshop and began to draw.

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On paper, I can draw perfect straight lines and evenly round curves and circles. When I started drawing with the tablet everything was the opposite, it was like I had to learn how to draw all over again. Not a single line was straight and every curve/circle looked like deflated balloons. What did I get myself into...

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Disheartened, I left the tablet alone. Every now and then I would pull it out and draw, some of the content worked out, but it was only mediocre. I had been drawing for years, I had to be better. After talking to one of my friends who was the opposite of me (She could draw very well on tablets but said she wasn't as good on paper), she gave me some good advice and kept me grounded; "It's a big change and takes a long time to get used to, especially if you have never used it before. So I practiced for ages and played around with it, trying to just let go like I do with pencils and paper.

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Eventually the time came when I had to draw up the girl for my painting. I Started off with the face, separating each element into new layers each time; but only drawing half of the girl. After millions and millions of redo's, I finally got the left eye to look decent enough for a starting point, so I did what a few digital artists do and duplicated & flipped it to the other side. Soon the nose, eyebrows, mouth and ears were done. Progress was beginning to build up faster, and after not long the face was done. For the body I used the same method, drawing the left side and then duplicating it to the right side. The proportions were looking good and I was happy with the result, Looks like buying the tablet did pay off. I finished off the digital drawing with the hair, this was a lot easier but time consuming as I drew what felt like a billion strands but it did end up looking the way I intended it to.

 

Finally it was done.

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Using the Wacom tablet is still very difficult for me to use and I still usually just stick to drawing, I think that the hardest part to get used to is looking at the screen while my hand is drawing blindly. It is definitely something I want to improve on in the future, but I'm glad that I decided to use this idea. It has opened up a new artistic perspective and skill for me to work and improve on, but most importantly, I had finished the second section to my painting.

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And now that I had completed my foundation concept and digital template, It was time to create the skeleton of my painting. 

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